An Explorers Club Book
Classic tales of Westerners who crossed behind the veil
More than a century before the recent conflicts with Saddam Hussein, Osama bin Laden, and Islamic insurgents, an international crisis ignited between the United States and the Middle East. In May 1904, Moroccan warlord Mulai Ahmed el Raisuni kidnapped Ion Perdicaris, a wealthy Greek-American resident of Tangier, in an attempt to extort money from the Sultan of Morocco. President Theodore Roosevelt responded by dispatching a squadron of seven battleships to the Moroccan coast with the order: Perdicaris alive or Raisuni dead. The nine-week standoff between U.S. troops and Raisuni exposed the impotence of emerging American power and revealed a critical misunderstanding about Moroccan politics. When it was discovered that Perdicaris was not an American citizen after all, the U.S. government kept the embarrassing episode a secret until 1933. Profiting royally from the conflict, Raisuni built his palace, the "House of Tears," soon after.
In this page-turning blend of compelling adventure and travel narrative, historian John Hughes reintroduces this and other vintage tales of Westerners who traveled to Islamic lands. Here we witness Englishman Thomas Pellow's rise from slave of a homicidal sultan- a man who kept the ears of his victims as
trophies-to commander of the Moroccan army in the 1700s. A century later, London Times correspondent and professional adventurer Walter B. Harris risks his life by entering the holy city of Chefchouaen, Morocco, in disguise. In his account of Constantinople in 1916, John Reed describes an empire teetering on the brink of collapse. And who could forget Lowell Thomas'slegendary account of the man who would become known as "Lawrence of Arabia"? Woven throughout these stories is the collaboration between Muslims and Westerners as together they faced perilous journeys across deserts, mountain passes, and into forbidden cities.
House of Tears is a treasury of the most exciting and revealing narratives ever published about the Islamic world from the last several decades. Not only is this Explorers Club Book a fine compendium of true adventure stories, but it is also a collection that celebrates the fine nuances of cultural encounters, in times of peace as well as conflict.


More than a century before Saddam Hussein, Osama bin Laden, and Islamic insurgents, an international crisis ignited between the United States and the Middle East. In May 1904 Moroccan warlord Mulai Ahmed er Raisuli kidnapped Ion Perdicaris, a wealthy Greek-American resident of Tangier, in an attempt to extort money from the Sultan of Morocco. President Theodore Roosevelt responded by dispatching a squadron of seven battleships to the Moroccan coast with the order: "Perdicaris alive or Raisuli dead." The nine-week standoff between U.S. troops and Raisuli exposed the impotence of emerging American power and a critical misunderstanding about Moroccan politics. When it was discovered that Perdicaris was not an American citizen after all, the U.S. government kept the embarrassing episode a secret until 1933. Profiting royally from the conflict, Raisuli built his palace, the "House of Tears."
In this page-turning blend of travel narrative and compelling adventure, historian John Hughes includes this and other tales of Westerners who traveled to Islamic lands during the eighteenth to twentieth centuries. Englishman Thomas Pellow describes his rise from the slave of a homicidal sultan to the commander of the Moroccan army in the 1700s. Walter B. Harris, a "London Times correspondent and professional adventurer, risks his life in 1886 by entering the holy city of Chefchouaen, Morocco, in disguise. John Reed arrives in Constantinople in 1916 just as the Ottoman Empire teeters on the brink of collapse. Lowell Thomas's account of his controversial relationship with T. E. Lawrence sheds light on the Lawrence of Arabia myth. Freya Stark, who worked for British Intelligence in Yemen, Egypt, andIraq during World War II, astutely notes the simmering hostility of the Iraqis toward the British.
House of Tears is a treasury of the most exciting and revealing narratives ever published about the Islamic world from the last several decades. Not only is this a fine compendium of true adventure stories, but it is also a collection that celebrates the fine nuances of cultural encounters, in times of peace as well as conflict.